LI-STBY-0943

Record Date: 
28 February 2013
Graveyard: 
Stradbally
Exact wording of epitaph: 

In memory of
T Gilley Major late 7th Royal
Fusiliers & 78th Highlanders Military Secretary
to Lord Frederick Fitzclarence
Commander-in-chief in India died Easter Day 1869
& his sons Frederick Lieut Royal Engineers
Died in his 22nd year & Arthur Lieut 34th Regt who served in
the India Mutiny (Cawnpore Lucknow) Accidentally shot aged 19

Memorial Type: 
Wall or mural tablet
Grave location
County: 
Limerick
Latitude: 
52.708024722222
Longitude: 
-8.5067613888889
Number of people commemorated: 
4
People commemorated: 
Title: 
Major
Name: 
T
Surname: 
Gilley
Date of death - day: 
28
Date of death - month: 
March
Date of death - year: 
1869
Name: 
Frederick
Surname: 
Gilley
Age: 
22
Relationship with first person: 
Son
Name: 
Arthur
Surname: 
Gilley
Age: 
19
Relationship with first person: 
Son
Name: 
Lord Frederick
Surname: 
Fitzclarence
Notes: 

See also graves LI-STBY-0293 and -0313.
I think the Gilleys commemorated here and in the two graves listed above, lived in the Rock Lodge, Castleconnell for several generations. My father was Ernie Cox of Woodbine, Castleconnell (1890-1975) and is buried in grave number 0335 (a Castleconnell ‘man born and reared’). He told me that the original Gilley (Major Thomas or was there a generation earlier?) was the illegitimate son of a lady-in-waiting called Lady Gillimore and a senior member of the British royal family. The story goes that he was given the anonymised surname Gilley and the house and some land in Castleconnell, which was deemed to be in an obscure place far from the royal family’s normal locations! Grave 0313 names Alfred Gilley of The Rock, died July 1st 1922. The so called ‘India Mutiny’ in Lucknow took place in 1857. The Rock Lodge is listed on the website www.buildingsofireland.ie as dating from 1780-1800. As a child in the 1950s and 60s I remember walking from our house ‘Woodbine’ to church in All Saints using a footpath going in front of the Rock Lodge and entering the graveyard at a stile on the eastern boundary (now overgrown). Compare this note to notes on LI-STBY-0293.
Ann Cox eanncox@gmail.com